Autumn Season 2014/15

The Royal Ballet opens the Autumn Season with Kenneth MacMillan’s masterful Manon. Highlights for The Royal Opera include Plácido Domingo in Verdi’s dark political tragedy I due Foscari and - in a new collaboration with the Roundhouse - Monteverdi’s Orfeo.

BalletBoyz the TALENT (Linbury Studio Theatre)
16–27 September
Former Royal Ballet dancers Michael Nunn and William Trevitt and their award-winning troupe come to the Linbury Studio Theatre for the first time, with an all-new programme.

Manon
26 September–1 November; Live cinema relay on 16 October
By Kenneth MacMillan
Kenneth MacMillan's acclaimed tragic ballet is a modern masterpiece.

Cassandra NEW (Linbury Studio Theatre)
30 October–1 November
By Ludovic Ondiviela
Choreographer Ludovic Ondiviela and singer songwriter Ana Silvera present a poignant exploration of what it is to be called mad.

Don Quixote
25 November–22 January
By Carlos Acosta after Marius Petipa
Carlos Acosta's exuberant production of this classic tale of friendship, love and loyalty is bursting with joie de vivre.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
6 December 2014–16 January 2015; Live cinema relay on 16 December
Welcome Performance for Families 6 December
By Christopher Wheeldon
Follow Alice down the rabbit hole in Christopher Wheeldon’s thrillingly entertaining ballet.

The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party NEW (Linbury Studio Theatre)
6 December 2014–3 January 2015
ZooNation
ZooNation burst onto the stage with their family Christmas show, a wonderfully wacky take on the madcap characters of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

The Trial NEW (Linbury Studio Theatre)
10–18 October
Philip Glass
Lib: Christopher Hampton
Dir: Michael McCarthy
Cond: Michael Rafferty
Philip Glass, one of the world's most popular contemporary composers, creates a new work for Music Theatre Wales based on Kafka's nightmarish novel.

La scala di seta(Linbury Studio Theatre)
23–4 October
Gioachino Rossini
Dir: Greg Eldridge §
Cond: Jonathan Santagada §
The Jette Parker Young Artists present a fully staged performance in the Linbury Studio Theatre, in one of the most popular highlights of Meet the Young Artists Week.
§ Jette Parker Young Artist

I due FoscariNEW
14 October–2 November; Live cinema relay on 27 October
Giuseppe Verdi
Dir: Thaddeus Strassberger
Cond: Antonio Pappano / Renato Balsadonna
A despairing father is torn between love for his family and duty to a corrupt city in Verdi's searing early tragedy.

So many thanks for restoring the Magazine listings calendar, 'in response to public demand'~ for once that phrase has real meaning, and your many enthusiastic Friends will be more than grateful for your ready action.
To be sure, in the many years I have been devouring mailings from Covent Garden, diverse demands for space have grown exponentially, and it must now be almost impossible to reconcile these into the one Friends' Magazine.........but long may you continue to square the circle, Susan, Teresa and Anne.

I'm shattered, while I'm in london there is no ballets on, is there anything else to do with ballet on at all between the dates the 14th of September to the 19th of September? (aside from the ballet boys thing)

Olivia. The "Ballet Boyz thing" is well worth seeing. It is a new programme, so I am unable to comment on the content, but I have seen their previous work. They work with fine choreographers, like Russell Maliphant and Liam Scarlett, and their dancing is vibrant, skilful and highly professional.

Why were the above articles of various dates not received till today. This was the first notification of the new packages and left no time for full consideration or discussion with friends as to choice of dates. This new arrangement could turn out to be a shambles. Let us see what happens at 10.00am tomorrow!

It's disappointing that the website is still falling over when a tranche of booking opens. It's been a very frustrating hour, although I was ultimately successful because I happen to have had the time today to wait for the servers to come up again, and again, and again.

Horrified to just discover this morning (the day of Friends Booking) that the L'Elisir performance on 22nd November isn't available for general booking. Although I applaud the concept of encouraging families who have never been to the opera before to attend a performance, a closed performance, such as this does need to be indicated as such in the magazine. Good communication is really important!

'Unfortunately the agreement regarding the performance on 22 November was finalized after the magazine has gone to print. We always encourage the Friends to visit our website for changes. In this case, we also highlighted the change in our e-news which was sent in April after the magazine arrived.'

Thank you, Ellen for taking this up with the Friends Team. I've just checked the e-news that came out in April, and although there's a link to "Welcome Performances", I can't find any information that tells me either in the e-mail or in the link that the 22nd November performance of L'Elisir is a Welcome Performance or that it is not available for general booking!